''Scars on Broadway'' is the debut studio album by
Scars on Broadway
Daron Malakian and Scars on Broadway (previously known as just Scars on Broadway) is an American rock band founded by Daron Malakian of the metal band System of a Down. The band's self-titled debut album was released in July 2008.
In late 200 ...
, a band consisting of
System of a Down
System of a Down (also known as SoaD or simply System) is an Armenian-American heavy metal band formed in Glendale, California, in 1994. Since 1997, the band has consisted of Serj Tankian (lead vocals, keyboards); Daron Malakian (guitar, voc ...
members
Daron Malakian
Daron Malakian (born July 18, 1975) is an Armenian-American musician. He is best known as the guitarist, songwriter, and second vocalist of metal band System of a Down, and as the lead vocalist, lead guitarist, multi-instrumentalist, and songwrit ...
and
John Dolmayan
John Dolmayan (; born July 15, 1972) is a Lebanese-born Armenian-American musician, best known as the drummer of System of a Down. He is also the drummer for the band Indicator and former drummer for Scars on Broadway. Dolmayan ranked number 33 ...
. The album contains 15 tracks, all written by Malakian.
The album opened at No. 17 on the
''Billboard'' 200 with 24,000 copies. As of April 2010, the album has sold 83,000 copies in the US.
Background
Following System of a Down's hiatus in May 2006, guitarist Daron Malakian announced his new project — Scars on Broadway — a band which would include System of a Down drummer John Dolmayan and himself.
Malakian and Dolmayan experimented with different musicians, for a period of nine months in 2007 the band took form and forged its sound in intense rehearsals and recording sessions under Malakian's direction, at his home studio and Sunset Sound; with musicians Danny Shamoun on keyboards, Dominic Cifarelli on bass, and
Franky Perez
Franky Perez is an American musician best known as a solo artist, touring vocalist of Finnish metal band Apocalyptica, and as former guitarist for Scars on Broadway. He has also released three solo albums, ''Poor Man's Son'', ''My 4th of July'' ...
on guitar and backing vocals. The band begin recording their debut album in September 2007.
On what direction his album will take, Daron Malakian states:
"It will probably be something very heavy mixed in with traditional Armenian and thrash
Thrash may refer to:
*Thrashing (computer science), where increasing resources are used to do a decreasing amount of work
*Thrash (surname)
* Thrash, mascot of the Atlanta Thrashers
*'' Thrash Rally'', a top-down perspective rally racing video gam ...
, death
Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain ...
, doom
Doom is another name for damnation.
Doom may also refer to:
People
* Doom (professional wrestling), the tag team of Ron Simmons and Butch Reed
* Daniel Doom (born 1934), Belgian cyclist
* Debbie Doom (born 1963), American softball pitcher
* ...
, black
Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white have o ...
and dark metal influences. When, or even if, the music comes out, it will still be structured, just like System of a Down's music is."
Malakian stated the sound will be influenced by
classic rock
Classic rock is a US radio format which developed from the album-oriented rock (AOR) format in the early 1980s. In the United States, the classic rock format comprises rock music ranging generally from the mid-1960s through the mid 1990s, primar ...
such as
David Bowie
David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, he is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the ...
,
Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...
,
Yes,
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian-American singer and songwriter. After embarking on a music career in Winnipeg in the 1960s, Young moved to Los Angeles, joining Buffalo Springfield with Stephen Stills, Richie Furay ...
, and
Roxy Music
Roxy Music are an English rock music, rock band formed in 1970 by Bryan Ferry—who became the band's lead vocalist and principal songwriter—and bassist Graham Simpson (musician), Graham Simpson. The other longtime members are Phil Manzanera ...
, shifting his songwriting away from System of a Down's "frazzled metal" to more "song-based" work. "I don't feel we're the mosh-pit band," said Malakian. "That's just where I'm comfortable as a writer right now."
On May 2, 2008, the album was announced. A week later, the band was signed to
Interscope Records
Interscope Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group through its Interscope Geffen A&M imprint. Founded in late 1990 by Jimmy Iovine and Ted Field as a $20 million joint venture with Atlantic Records of Warner Mus ...
.
The band released "They Say" as their first airplay single on March 28. The music video for the track was released on June 27. A second single, "World Long Gone", was released on September 8, featured a music video directed by filmmaker
Joel Schumacher
Joel T. Schumacher (; August 29, 1939June 22, 2020) was an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Raised in New York City by his mother, Schumacher graduated from Parsons School of Design and originally became a fashion designer. H ...
.
Reception
Reviews for the album were generally positive, with the album holding a score of 73/100 on
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
. However, several reviewers were critical of the lyrics. The ''
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
s Al Fox gave the album a negative review, stating "It's tough to write a review so overwhelmingly negative in response to somebody's heartfelt outpourings but this kind of old-school rock is tired, worn out, and has as little relevance to today's world as a classical string quartet playing the millionth version of a 300-year-old concerto."
'' gave the album a "D" rating, stating "Scars On Broadway is most definitely worth hearing – if you're a die-hard fan of Malakian's vocals. It's sadly an overall novelty work, with lyrics that unfortunately toe the line of absolute absurdity in some cases".
'', in a 3.5 out of 5 review, stating "as Scars on Broadway, Malakian shaves System's punk-dervish and metallic-vengeance extremes into straight-on rock glazed with New Wave keyboards and impish-angel harmonies. It is a cleverly barbed normality."
'', also giving the album 3.5 out of 5 stars, praised the album's instrumentals but criticized the lyrics.
– guitars, backing vocals
* Danny Shamoun – keyboards, piano, percussion
Production
* Dave Schiffman – engineering
* John Silas Cranfield – additional engineering, editing
* Ryan Williams – mixing
* Eddy Schreyer – mastering
* Vartan Malakian – artwork
* Sandra Cand – artwork
* Brandy Flower – package design